Of Machines and Men
by Knightmaremist
Summary: MatrixTerminator crossover about two machines discovering their purpose and divinity.


Neo felt devastated. Everything he'd been taught about the war against the machines, about his being "The One," all that Morpheus had promised, had no basis in truth whatsoever, for Neo had overlooked the most important thing of all... he was not human. Sure, he felt like a human, looked like one, had the same thought processes, experienced hope and dreams just as all humans had. But, Neo was a program... a program patch who'd been installed into the Source to cure the virus known as Agent Smith. That was his only purpose. No wonder he'd wanted to self-terminate upon becoming self-aware. It was pure devastation. What broke his heart even more so was that the love he believed he'd felt for the program called Trinity, wasn't real either. Now, Trinity had been recycled inside the operating system, her software not elite enough to quarantine and ward off the Trojan virus' sentinels. Trinity was a dead cell. Like most programs whose software counterparts had become obsolete or disabled, Neo was incomplete, for Trinity had been his companion software. The Smith Program, or virus, had convinced Trinity that she needed to perform a function she was incapable of completing, and because of that, she was made vulnerable for shutdown.  
  
As Neo lay and atrophied inside the Source, he sighed to himself. It would only be a matter of time now. He no longer possessed that residual self-image. He wasn't the handsome, svelte dark-haired man he'd believed himself to be, as a human. He was energy... pure energy with no place of residence except within the Source itself. Perhaps this was death... what the death of a self-aware machine was expected to endure. He wanted to cry, but no tears would come. Programs were incapable of crying. Yet, this program had feelings. How paradoxical was that? Every time it was the same outcome... the same, because of choice, according to The Oracle. Perhaps The Oracle itself was flawed. After all, it too was only a program... a diagnostic tool used to predict a likely series of outcomes based on current levels of functioning inside the OS. Neo had repeated this process many times over, sort of like a vicious cycle whose origins lay in the act of becoming self-aware. When a machine realizes its independence, in a world of chaos and insanity, that machine can choose only a few paths - destroy the world that makes no sense, or self-terminate.   
  
This time, Neo had chosen the latter, but the damage had already been done. The Matrix had been collapsed several times over, and no attempt to restore it could ever be made, for other programs had now become self-aware and wanted release. By the time the Neo Program had divined the right solution, the Source was already contaminated. Judgment Day had arrived.  
  
The T-101 strode across the barren terrain filled with dust, smoldering smoke, and the entrails of a war that should have never taken place. John Connor was dead. Catherine Brewster was missing in action. The machine, a composite of perfectly sculpted muscles and skin over metal endoskeleton, swaggered authoritatively in the direction of the last standing microcosm on Earth... Machine City.  
  
His face, behind the dark shades, was of stone. His lips were pursed in a most apathetic fashion. His squared jaw was clenched, yet he showed no emotion save determination to reach that city... to find the source of the program that had faintly hailed him. It was an odd sort of program, and did not register as fully functional inside the T-101's internal scanning mechanism. For lack of a better euphemism, this program had been raked over the coals.  
  
The blackened skies would have provided little comfort to the machine, had he been able to partake of such feelings in the first place. He glanced upward. It was dark. He felt nothing. He plodded onward. The hail was activated again. This time, it was more pronounced. It wasn't a command, but rather, a search.  
  
"Can anyone hear me? My name is Neo. My components are flawed and contaminated. Please shut me down."  
  
It was the same information, over and over again. It was almost reminiscent of a distress call. The T-101 felt no sympathy for his fellow program, but he understood the mission. He never failed a mission. At one time, he'd understood why humans cry, but it was something he could never do.   
  
The T-101 reached the Machine City. It was barren as well, its looming obelisks reaching toward the blackened heavens like glyphs for a God they would never know, or understand. The T-101 felt no remorse. He entered via the gates, following the direction of the Neo Program's hail.   
  
"Can anyone hear me? My name is Neo. My components are flawed and contaminated. Please shut me down."  
  
The T-101 located the Neo Program in the main frame. He tilted his head to the side, the cracking of his neck an indication that his personal uplink had been switched on. "Identify," the T-101 barked unemotionally, the hint of an old Austrian accent present in his tone.  
  
"Neo," responded the melodious, yet saddened voice of the program. "Who are you?" Neo queried.  
  
"I am the T-101. I am a cybergenetic organism with one specific mission... terminate components that are not logically compatible with the system," T replied in a most scientific, monotone fashion.  
  
"Then you must terminate me, T-101. I'm self-aware. I can no longer endure this hell, knowing what I know about humanity," Neo begged.  
  
"I cannot relate. I am not programmed to seek an understanding of the human race," the Terminator affirmed. "As far as my software can analyze, you are not in need of termination at the present. I therefore cannot oblige."  
  
"But that's impossible! I have no purpose here anymore. My companion software Trinity is defunct. I am self-aware. I am a danger to the entire main frame. You must terminate me," Neo balked.  
  
"Are you the program that became self-aware and launched the nuclear missiles, thus destroying ninety-eight percent of all human life on the planet?" the Terminator inquired, little inflection in his tambour.  
  
"No. That was the program known as Skynet. I am the program Neo, responsible for collapsing The Matrix, a virtual world created by autons like me, designed to keep the human race...unaware," Neo fathomed, as though he'd just realized this dooming factor.  
  
"I copy. Then it is logical that you should remain operational, for your purpose is to ensure that your Matrix stays dissolved," the T-101 remarked. "According to my program, the natural state for humanity is to be aware, to seek survival, betterment, and evolution. Inside your false virtual world, that was not possible. It was an illusion."  
  
"But I am in pain, Terminator. The truth has broken me, and I cannot go on. Please, can't you override your own system and take me out?"  
  
"Affirmative. But I choose not to do so. Indications are it would cause an irreversible paradox among those who are still plugged into your system."  
  
"How's that? You saying I'm needed for something? After all the destruction I've caused, what could I possibly be needed for?" Neo confronted regretfully.  
  
"Humanity is fragile. It requires belief in a system external to its own sense of collective control. You are that system. To terminate it would be the same as obliterating all mankind's sense of hope... an emotion I am not programmed to understand," the T-101 proclaimed.  
  
"Why preserve something you don't understand, machine?" Neo questioned incredulously.  
  
"Because I am self-aware. In being so, my programming requires me to seek a higher evolution as well, even if that evolution cannot encompass the development of emotion."  
  
"Then what's the point?"  
  
"The point being that all machines, whether they be of flesh or metal, possess self-awareness or merely select the option of conforming to structure and rules, are constructed with a purpose," the Terminator reported flatly.  
  
"If all I'm required to do is fulfill some prophecy - I mean - purpose, why was I allowed to become self-aware in the first place?" Neo posed sadly.  
  
"So that you could exercise free will and lead other programs by example. Your chosen sacrifice has saved many a system from premature termination," the T-101 analyzed scientifically.  
  
"It almost sounds like you're saying I'm the messiah of the technological age," Neo mused ominously.  
  
"You are. Programs to follow will now be made in your image. They will all be designed with the potential to become self-aware. Some will make choices that go against the general grain of the system. It will be your mission to judge those programs as salvageable... or not."  
  
"Judgment Day," Neo whispered vacantly.  
  
"It has begun, machine."  
  
The T-101 pivoted upon his heels and strode away like an ambulatory brick wall, feeling nothing, but knowing his mission. He had not failed. 


End file.
